


Sticks and Stones

by SoThatHappened



Category: The 100 (TV), The 100 Series - Kass Morgan
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-18
Updated: 2016-02-18
Packaged: 2018-05-21 09:49:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,600
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6047157
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SoThatHappened/pseuds/SoThatHappened
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Lexa gets hurt during a sword fighting training session she meets Clarke, an entirely too cute paramedic, who comes to her rescue. <br/>Sticks and stones may break your bones, but love is something else.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> here's a weird fact: this idea came to me while i was in an ambulance with a cute paramedic sucking on laughing gas.......

It felt like fire, and all Lexa could think about was how much she wanted to be floating in a tub of ice. Voices were surrounding her but she couldn’t concentrate on what any of them were saying, everyone was talking so fast it sounded like a jumble anyway. Bodies were moving around her, panicking, unable to stay still. 

 _That should be me_ she thought from where she was lying on the grass, unable to pull herself up. The agonising throb of the pain in her side was making her feel weak, her vision blurring ever so slightly as she tried to look around. She couldnt even muster the strength to sit forward and inspect the hole that was in the side of her body. She could feel the warmth of her blood seeping between her fingers, and wondered if perhaps she might die right here.

Suddenly the crowd around her was parting, someone was shouting, Lexa tried to look back at what was happening, but she began to waver in and out of consciousness and had to quickly shut her eyes as her head stopped spinning. 

_Lexa._

_Shit._

_Get her on the stretcher, now._

“Lexa” the voice was louder and more insistent.

“Can you hear me?”

Lexa’s eyes fluttered open, a girl was hovering above her like some kind of anxious angel.

“Hey, there you are” the girl said her face relaxing into a soft smile.

“You need to stay with me okay, my name's Clarke, I'm the paramedic”

Lexa tried to nod, her eyes felt heavy and she struggled to keep them open.

“Lexa, we need to lift you, this is gonna hurt a little bit okay?”

Lexa felt hands on her body, gentle, practiced, but ever so slightly frantic. There was a sharp jerk and she felt her body leaving the muddy grass, then suddenly it was over. 

The girl, Clarke, reappeared in front of her, she was wearing green, it didn’t match her eyes. Her eyes were blue. Lexa strained to focus on the girls face but her vision was still blurred, she didn’t even notice that she had been moved into the back of the ambulance. She kept her eyes fixated on Clarke, watching her move around, she pulled an oxygen mask over Lexa’s face, and she felt something cold wrap around her arm, suddenly tightening uncomfortably. Clarke noted something down on her clipboard before ripping the equipment off her arm discarding it to the side.

“How are you doing?” Clarke asked glancing up at Lexa as she pulled a pair of scissors from the kit beside her.

“Hurts” Lexa managed to mumble under the oxygen mask, and Clarke smiled.

“I’m going to cut your shirt, yeah? I have to dress this wound”

Lexa just nodded watching as Clarke hacked her shirt in half and pulled it to the side, exposing the bloodied wound. Usually Lexa would have reacted to someone ripping her clothes up so aggressively, and the fact that she was now half naked in front of a stranger, but none of that crossed her mind, not as soon as she saw the blood that covered her stomach.

Tipping her head back she stared up at the ceiling of the ambulance focusing on her breathing. This hadn’t been anybodies fault, except her own. She wanted to kick herself for not being more careful. She was always careful, but the one time she had pushed just that tiny bit further over the line, this happened. 

Something cold and wet touched her stomach making her jump slightly at the abruptness. She made sure she focused on keeping her eyes up, as much as she wanted to look at her wound she also didn’t want to know. Clarke quickly applied a dressing to the wound followed by a large gauze to absorb the blood the rest of the blood. 

She gently poked around the wound then, placed her fingers on the side of Lexa’s neck checking her airways.

“Sword fighting huh? Who even does that?” Clarke asked as she began to scribble something down.

“Me” Lexa mumbled, always finding herself feeling offended that people were so confounded by her choice of sport. 

“Does this happen often?” Clarke asked, Lexa couldn’t tell whether she was trying to be humorous or not, the girl was still looking down at her clipboard but there was the faintest trace of a smile on her face as she did.

“Never” Lexa said feeling uncomfortably awkward trying to communicate with the oxygen mask on.

Clarke suddenly got up and tapped on the door to the front seats.

“How far?” 

“Still at least 10” the voice replied and Clarke sat back down, pulling the oxygen mask off Lexa’s face.

“Hows your chest feeling?”

“Fine” Lexa replied.

“Your breathing seems normal, you’re not struggling at all?”

“No” 

“And hows your pain?”

“Unpleasant”

Clarke nodded, reaching behind Lexa and pulling a tube forward with a strange green end.

“I want you to suck on this, like an oversized milkshake straw, nice deep breaths” she said handing it to Lexa who took it hesitantly.

“What is it?”

“Laughing gas” Clarke smirked and Lexa just stared at her.

“Don’t be a martyr it will help” she insisted and Lexa glanced at the tube before taking a deep breath from it.

Clarke nodded “Take about 10 breaths, it’ll be more effective” 

Lexa glanced at Clarke, unable to feel anything different about this gas yet but continued to take another few breaths, almost unaware that the pain was no longer bothering her.

“It doesn’t appear that you have any internal bleeding, or that the sword hit any of your organs, which is extremely lucky, you’ve lost quite a bit of blood though, and you’ll have to have CT once we get you to trauma” 

Lexa was trying to listen but all of a sudden she felt extremely light headed, as though she had drunk a whole bottle of wine. She had carefully been counting her breaths on the tube, she was suddenly worried that she had too much, staring out the window she watched the people and cars fly by her in a coloured blur as the ambulance overtook everyone.

“Lexa” Clarke’s voice snapped her attention back.

“What’s your pain like now on a scale of one to ten?”

 _God she’s cute_ Lexa thought staring at Clarke, her blonde hair pulled back in a braid with some strands hanging loose. _She has such a nice mouth, such perfect lips….when did paramedics get to be so cute?_ Lexa thought.

“Cute” Lexa replied, a smile almost crossing her face before she realised her mistake, glancing away from Clarke’s raised eyebrow.

“Two” she answered again “I don’t know where it went” she mumbled trying to hide her embarrassment. 

“Well that’s good” Clarke said reaching out and lightly putting pressure onto the wound.

“Keep sucking on that gas, and we might even get a smile from you” 

“Okay… Clarke” Lexa said testing the name out in her mouth. Clarke glanced over at her at the sound of her name and smiled. _Why is she so pretty, don’t smile, stop it!_ Lexa’s lightheaded thoughts were running free in her brain.

 

Clarke watched Lexa take breath after breath on the nitrous oxide, never failing to be amused by people who had it for the first time. She recognised the spaced out look they got in their eyes and the slight mumble of their words as they tried to say everything that was on their mind at the same time.

She had been shocked to find such it had been such young woman who had been training the sword fighters. She had been expecting someone much older, much stranger, than the girl who was sitting in front of her. 

She felt a pang of separation anxiety as they pulled into the ambulance bay outside the trauma ward, and her colleague ran to get the doors open as Clarke prepped to get Lexa inside. She didn’t want to leave Lexa here by herself, she had no one listed as her emergency contact and had shown no signs of wanting to inform anyone of what had happened. There was also the niggling little fear at the pit of her stomach that Lexa might die, that she may not being showing symptoms of haemorrhaging, or clotting, or airway obstruction, but what if the sword had grazed one of her organs? What if something happened? The boy had apparently pulled the sword out immediately when he realised what had happened, which is dangerous in itself, he could have hurt her even more by doing that.

 _Stop it, Clarke_ she told herself as she jumped out of the ambulance, pulling up the sides of the stretcher and wheeling her briskly through the ER. _Don’t get attached, you know better than that._ But glancing down at Lexa was the worst mistake she had made, she could see the girl was scared, but was clearly not new to hiding it. Clarke suddenly wanted nothing more but to tell Lexa she was going to be okay. But she couldn’t do that, there was no way she could make that call. 

“What’ve we got?” a doctor called out coming round the corner grabbing the clipboard off Clarke.

“Hey Clarke” he said before glancing down at it.

“Jackson, this is Lexa, stab wound to the lower right, BP 90 over 60, heart rate 120, doesn’t appear to have internal bleeding, or airway obstructions”

“How’d you get a stab wound Lexa?” Jackson asked as they moved through the doors to of the trauma unit.

“Sword fighting” Clarke replied before Lexa could open her mouth and Jackson glanced at her before looking down at Lexa.

“Well, that’s badass, and weird” he said gesturing for Clarke to wheel her into the empty space.

“Alright Lexa, we’ve gotta move you onto the bed, it might tug a little so can you put your hand on the gauze and apply a bit of pressure”

Lexa quickly obliged and a team of nurses was suddenly surrounding her.

“Three, two, one” the jolt was unpleasant but didn’t hurt as much as she thought it would, still feeling lightheaded she came to the conclusion that the gas was still working.

“Okay lets have a look at this” Jackson said snapping his blue gloves on and lifting the dressing that Clarke had applied. 

He pressed gently around the wound but it was enough to make Lexa flinch, Clarke found herself hovering nervously waiting to see what he was going to say. Jackson always frowned as he worked which Clarke felt was a major downfall of his, especially right now, when she just needed to know this girl, this stranger, was going to be okay. 

Pulling his stethoscope off his neck he put it in and pressed lightly to Lexa’s chest, she lay perfectly still watching his every move. 

“I think you got lucky, Lexa” he said “It hasn’t ruptured any major organs, and you’re not bleeding internally, it looks like a pretty clean cut, but we’ll get you scanned just to sure, other than that we’ll stitch you up and monitor you for 24 hours”

Lexa nodded.

“Thank you” she said quietly.

“Hows the pain right now?” he asked.

“I’ll be alright” she said, ignoring the fact that now she was starting to feel the constant burning throb again.

“Okay, I’ll be back in a minute, I’ll get the scan set up for you” he said and pulled the curtain around her bed.

“What are you still doing here Griffin?” he asked “You have paperwork”

“I know” Clarke said quickly trying to busy herself “I know”

“You know her?” He asked.

“No, I… I’m just” she couldn’t finish that sentence, she didn’t have an explanation. She sighed and picked up the clipboard.

“Will you let me know if she’s okay?”

“Clarke” Jackson practically scolded her.

“She’s scared Jackson, and she doesn’t have any emergency contacts”

Jackson rolled his eyes.

“Yeah Clarke, fine”

 

Lexa waited patiently for the doctor to come back, her breaths were becoming quicker and sharper as she tried to ignore the pain that had set back in to the side of her stomach. Her jaw was locked tightly as she was determined not to be so weak. She tried to distract herself by thinking about all the other people that had far worse injuries than she did, people that were a fingers reach away from death. But that didn’t stop the agonising throb. Curling her hand into a fist beside her she tried to take deeper breaths, and began to wonder if Clarke was going to come back.

 _Why would she come back, Lexa?_ she asked herself, _she’s a paramedic, she’s not your friend, she’s not in charge of you anymore._

Letting out an uncomfortable groan Lexa tried to shift her position but found it was even more painful than before.

Doctor Jackson came back around, pushing her curtain open and pulling up the side rails of the bed.

“Let’s get you scanned Lexa” he said.

As he wheeled her into the corridor Lexa saw Clarke standing by the nurses station filling out some paperwork. She wanted to call out, say something, anything really, but the words didn’t make it to her mouth in time before they passed her, and she got pushed through the double doors.

 

Clarke saw her go past, she saw Lexa look back at her, she saw lips part as though she was going to say something. She wished Lexa had said something, it could have been anything. But she hadn’t. She hadn’t even seen Clarke look back at her, watch her disappear through the doors, and silently pray that she would be okay. _Don’t get attached, Clarke_ she repeated to herself in her head, reaching up and touching the necklace around her neck. _Nothing good comes from getting attached. Nothing permanent anyway._


	2. Chapter 2

As Lexa was prepped for surgery Clarke was on her lunch break, although she couldn’t shake Lexa off her mind.

She stood in the hospital cafe with her half eaten sandwich and pulled her phone out she only had one message, from Octavia, asking if she wanted to come out tonight.

_What I need is a 3 day nap._

She quickly replied before tucking her phone back into her pocket. Her job was exhausting, she didn’t have a lot of time to fit socialising in, and when she did she was always extremely tired and would often fall asleep on someones couch.

Eating the remainder of her sandwich she wandered back to the ambulance wondering if Jackson would actually bother telling her whether Lexa was okay or not. She tried not to think about it, but typically that didn’t work in the slightest.

She didn’t know why she got attached to some patients more than others, most of the people she saw to hospital she would just do her job and let them go, hoping for the best, not a further thought, and that was that. There had only ever been one other occasion where she had felt this similar attachment, and that hadn’t ended well for her at all. She had sworn to herself, her training officers, and her friends that it would never happen again, getting attached to a patient just made everything harder. Especially when they don’t make it. 

*

Lexa couldn’t pretend that she wasn’t scared about going into surgery. Even if they were only going to stitch her up, she had never been into theatre before. She had been sword fighting her whole life and she had never been to hospital for an injury. Yes she’d had stitches here and there, from various scratches, but nothing like this, she had never been stabbed. 

She fidgeted with her fingers as the surgeon spoke to her, she seemed like a nice enough woman, but Lexa was still anxious. 

“This won’t take long, Lexa, you have nothing to worry about” Abby, her surgeon reassured her. 

“Okay” Lexa said her voice barely a whisper, trying to mask the fear.

“Hey” Abby said, placing a gloved hand on Lexa’s arm.

“My daughter once had a nail go straight through the bottom of her foot, now I know that’s not quite the same as being stabbed by a sword, but she cried and cried not because of the pain, but because she was terrified of being put under, but afterwards she realised it was just like taking a nap”

“Okay” Lexa said again nodding.

“I’ll take care of you, trust me” Abby said and Lexa tried her hardest to believe her. 

*

When Lexa opened her eyes her brain felt blurry, she couldn’t articulate a single thought. There was  man standing at the end of her bed, reading her charts but she couldn’t make out who it was.

“How are you feeling Lexa?” he asked and she grumbled, her head feeling heavy and drowsy. She couldn’t feel the fiery throb of her side anymore, in fact she couldn’t feel anything. She lifted her arm but it caused an aching tug on her hand. She glanced down and saw she was attached to a tube.

“We’ve got you on a morphine drip for a little while, just to ease your pain” the nurse said and Lexa felt her eyes begin to flutter shut again. 

*

When she opened her eyes again the light had changed, it was darker now, only the dim light above her kept her from being in complete darkness, someone in her recovery ward was snoring lightly, she could hear the beeping of various machines and the ambient sounds of hospital murmurings. 

She looked down at the papery white gown she was wearing and immediately glanced around for her belongings. She hadn’t had anything much on her, apart from her clothes when it had happened, and even then, she no longer had a top thanks to Clarke. _Clarke._ That thought stuck in her head as she wondered pointlessly if the paramedic had been back.

She propped herself up on her pillows and stared at the mustard and black checked curtain that was half pulled around her bed. Her eyes prickled with tears. _Stop it_ she told herself biting down hard on her tongue. _You have no reason to cry._ But she did, she had every reason. She didn’t have anyone to call, anyone to come and see if she was okay. She didn’t want to be in hospital, in this unfamiliar environment, surrounded by unfamiliar people who were acting like they knew her. She wanted her apartment, her bed, she just wanted to go home.

Her fingers picked at tape that was holding the needle into her hand, tempted to rip if off and take herself home. But she didn’t, she just sat there, listening to the sounds of people walking past her room, wishing one of them might stop and see if she was okay. 

 

As Lexa sat there, still and in silence, she wished she had something to do, literally anything to kill the time while she waited. She didn’t even know what time it was, the window near her bed had a curtain pulled so she figured it was night time. 

She heard footsteps approaching, they were squeaking on against the floor. They stopped briefly outside her door and there was a mumble of voices and a gentle laugh. Then the squeaky footsteps started again, and they were coming closer, and closer and suddenly a head peaked around her curtain.

Lexa almost jumped in fright at the unexpected visitor. 

“Hey you” Clarke smiled, her voice had a tired husk.

“Clarke” Lexa was shocked and it was the only word she managed to get out, she wondered if she was dreaming, or hallucinating from the amount of morphine that was in her system.

Clarke came into her tiny space, pulling the curtain around her and taking a seat on the edge of Lexa’s bed, she could have sat on the chair Lexa thought, there’s nothing wrong with the chair.

“Do you come and check if all of your patients are still alive?” she asked and Clarke shut her eyes shaking her head once.

“No, actually, but I uh…you” her voice trailed off as she opened her eyes and looked over at Lexa, her dark messy hair, and her eyes, Clarke couldn’t decide whether they were blue or green. Not that it mattered, it didn’t. But it did.

“I was worried” Clarke said finally. 

“Oh” Lexa replied.

“I’m sorry, I just-” Clarke said starting to stand realising that she had just invaded this girls space without even knowing whether she wanted her to be there or not.

“I can go”

“No, it’s fine, stay” Lexa said quickly as she watched Clarke start to leave.

“Please” she added.

Clarke sat back down and folded her hands in her lap. She wanted to look at Lexa but she knew it was a bad idea. Her being here right now was a bad idea. As soon as her shift had finished she had found Jackson and asked where Lexa was. That had been her first mistake. And now this.

“So you’re feeling okay?” Clarke asked biting her lower lip, breaking the silence that had settled between them.

“Yeah” Lexa looked at her hand “The drugs are helping”

Clarke smiled “Morphine is fun like that, arguably not as fun as laughing gas though”

“This makes my head fuzzy” Lexa said “I feel like I’m either going to fall asleep or say something stupid”

“Well if it makes you feel better I don’t need morphine to make me say stupid stuff”

Lexa’s mouth curled into a slight smile and she quickly looked down. 

“So what are you usually doing on a Friday night, sword fighter?” Clarke asked lifting an eyebrow inquisitively. 

“Not a lot, what about you?”

“It’s usually tea and sleeping” Clarke laughed “I’m always tired, always”

“Saving lives is a hard job” Lexa quipped.

“Not a lie” Clarke admitted “My friends try and drag me out, but I have a couple of drinks and fall asleep anyway”

“You don’t have to be here if you’re tired, Clarke” Lexa said quietly stealing a glance at the blonde who was currently tugging her braid out of her hair. 

Before Clarke had a chance to answer a nurse pulled the curtain back, surprised to see that Lexa had company at this time of night which probably wasn’t allowed, but seeing as Clarke still had her uniform on she obviously overlooked it.

“Miss Woods?” the nurse said looking at her charts at the end of her bed.

Lexa nodded.

“You’re due another morphine dose” she said going over Lexa.

Clarke watched Lexa, wondering how someone so gentle could do sword fighting. Maybe this wasn’t what she was like normally, maybe it was just the painkillers that were subduing her. Clarke didn’t believe that though, Lexa was quiet and mysterious. She had barely made a groan of pain when she had found her sprawled out on the grass with blood pouring from her side. 

“Thank you” Lexa said quietly as the nurse left.

“Can I ask you something?” Clarke asked once the nurses footsteps had gone.

“Of course” 

“Can I come and see you tomorrow?”

Lexa looked perplexed for a moment.

“I’m being discharged tomorrow, Clarke”

“I know” Clarke said “But I was just thinking”

There was no easy way for Clarke to bring this up, and she knew it was an invasive question, but she was used to asking them, it was part of her job. So why was this so hard?

“You don’t have an emergency contact”

“And?” Lexa asked her defences going up immediately and Clarke frowned, wanting to have avoided that.

“So you’d be going home, by yourself?” 

“Yes”

Clarke looked at her, right at her, her pupils were dilating a little bit which probably meant she had less than ten seconds before the high powered painkillers kicked in.

“Look I know it’s not my business, and you don’t know me, but if you didn’t want to be alone…”

“Clarke” Lexa interrupted her, but stopped abruptly as she felt her thoughts blur together. Morphine surging through her veins, relieving the tension on her side entirely, but jumbling everything that was in her head, including her words.

“Clarke, I’m be okay” she said with a definite nod.

“I’m be okay?” Clarke repeated with an amused smirk.

“Well that’s very convincing, thank you”

“Welcome” Lexa replied, blinking several times to keep her eyes open, she struggled against her brain to produce any kind of conducive thought, but everything remained scrambled. 

“Okay sword fighter, I should let you sleep” Clarke said.

“Wait” Lexa reached out to grab her, tugging on her stitches and falling back against her pillows with the tug of sharp pain that followed her movement.

“No, no, no” Clarke said quickly standing up and pushing Lexa’s shoulders back so she would stay down.

“No sudden movements, because it will hurt like hell, and we don’t want a popped stitch” Clarke told her.

“Clarke” Lexa said, and Clarke wondered if she had heard anything that she had just said.

“Clarke, my Clarkeness”

The blonde let out a small puff of laughter and crouched down beside Lexa.

“Yes honey?”

“Would you be so kind, as to help me toilet?”

Clarke lifted an eyebrow.

“Your highness wishes to pee?” Clarke asked standing up and holding her hand out.

“I’d be honoured”

Lexa reached out to take Clarke’s hand, but the blonde quickly slipped her arm around Lexa’s waist and helped slide her from the bed.

“Nice and slow” Clarke said softly, feeling most of Lexa’s weight shift onto her.

“My head feels heavy” Lexa muttered.

“Do you need to sit?” Clarke asked.

“On the toilet” Lexa clarified and Clarke couldn’t help but smile.

“Are you gonna make it?”

“My bladder is strong, Clarke”

“I meant walking” Clarke dug her fingers in lightly to Lexa’s ribs making her let out a sharp breath.

“Hey” Lexa protested “No”

 

Clarke finally managed to get Lexa into the bathroom closing the door quietly behind them, well aware of the other patients she was sharing a room with. 

“Should I turn around?” Clarke asked releasing Lexa from her grip, only a step away from the toilet.

“You know I meant it Lexa” she said “At least let me come and pick you up tomorrow”

“Clarke, why are you being so nice to me, Clarke?” Lexa asked steadying herself on the wall as she flushed the toilet.

“You got stabbed Lexa, I just want to make sure that you’re okay, it can still be dangerous-“

Lexa cut her off “Okay shh, bed”

Clarke raised an eyebrow, and stepped in slipping her arm around Lexa’s waist again taking her weight, trying to ignore how perfectly they fitted together.

When she got Lexa back to bed, she carefully arranged the blanket and pillows to make sure she was going to be comfortable, got her a glass of water and then hovered near the curtain.

“You need to get some rest, and I also need to find my bed before I pass out” Clarke smiled tiredly. 

“Thank you Clarke” Lexa mumbled struggling to hold her eyes open any longer.

“You saved my life”

“Any time, Lexa” Clarke said feeling a mount of sadness building in her bones that she may never see this girl again.

“Clarke” Lexa called out softly as Clarke began to pull the curtain across leaving Lexa by herself.

“Yes?”

“Maybe come back tomorrow?”

Clarke tried to hide the almost immediate grin.

“Maybe I will” she replied.

**Author's Note:**

> more to come :)  
> also please excuse my utter lack of medical knowledge, I based half of this off random google searches and the other half from being in hospital yesterday.  
> let me know what you think, feel free to hit me up on tumblr niehaus-vause !!!xxx


End file.
